Israel air strikes on Gaza Strip continue into fourth day

Israel was accused of killing three Palestinian civilians on Monday when its air force retaliated against rocket attacks on its southern cities by striking militant positions across Gaza for a fourth successive day.

Monday's fatalities brought the death toll in Gaza over the past four days to 23Photo: EPA/MOHAMMED SABER

By Adrian Blomfield, Jerusalem

3:55PM GMT 12 Mar 2012

Eight Israeli civilians, including an 80-year-old woman and a child, were wounded as one of the most serious cross-border conflagrations in three years showed no signs of abating despite Egyptian efforts to broker a truce.

The Israeli air force said it had carried out six bombing sorties against rocket launching sites and a weapons factory, killing two members of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the second largest militant group operating in Gaza.

Doctors in the territory said that two civilians, a 65-year-old man and his 35-year-old daughter, were also killed. Hamas, Gaza's Islamist overlords, said a teenage schoolboy also died in an attack by an Israeli drone, although other accounts suggested that he was killed when explosives he was carrying were accidentally detonated.

Monday's fatalities brought the death toll in Gaza over the past four days to 23. All but five were fighters from Palestinian Islamic Jihad and another Islamist group, the Popular Resistance Committees.

Israel has acknowledged killing a boy of 12 who was "uninvolved" in the fighting, according to Ehud Barak, the Israeli defence minister. At least 13 Israeli civilians have been wounded over the same period, one of them seriously.

The latest escalation of violence, among the most serious since Israel's last major incursion into Gaza ended in early 2009, began on Friday when Israeli air strikes killed 12 Palestinian militants.

Triggering fury in Gaza, the Popular Resistance Committee's battlefield commander was among the dead, killed in what Israel conceded was a "targeted assassination".

The Israeli military said it carried out the attacks to thwart a "major terrorist attack" by the group. The attack prompted the most sustained rocket barrage on Israeli residential areas in at least a year, with the cities of Beersheba, Ashdod and Ashkelon all coming under repeated attack.

More than 190 rockets have been fired so far, at least 50 of which were shot down by Israeli military interceptors. Most of the others fell in open country, although two struck Beersheba, one of which exploded in the courtyard of an empty school. Schools across southern Israel, home to one million people, were closed on Sunday in response to the attack.

Hamas, which has not been involved in the latest violence and is only thought to have fired rockets at Israel once in the past three years, worked with Egypt to mediate a truce.

So far, however, neither Israel nor Hamas's rivals appear willing to back down.

"The Zionist state began this aggression," said Ziad Nakbeh, the deputy secretary general of Palestinian Islamic Jihad. "It has to stop its aggression first and then we will evaluate the situation to study the possibility of calm."

Israel said it would hold Hamas responsible for the attacks because it governs Gaza. Despite the mounting tension, most observers believe that the latest violence will not lead to a major confrontation.

With Israel focused on the threat of Iran's nuclear programme, Benjamin Netanyahu, the country's prime minister, is not thought to want the distraction of another major offensive in Gaza – not least because he is unlikely to win significant international sympathy after more than 1,000 Palestinians were killed in the last Israeli incursion.

Hamas has also signalled that it is keen to avoid conflict, particularly after largely severing ties with Iran, its longtime patron. Some observers warn, however, that if the violence grows more protracted Hamas could be forced to join in or face public accusations of weakness against Israel.